Klein is an artist with a loyal following for her paintings, but she’s become famous making pillows. Famous in all kinds of places… except locally, in her hometown, where she quietly goes about her high-end work at k studio near Briggs Park. Nationally Shelly has gained broad recognition. Her work has been featured in such popular magazines as Better Homes & Gardens, People, Family Circle, Real Simple and Cottage Living, and on NBC’s “Today” show.

Before Klein’s pillow designs develop from her sketch pad into beautiful objects, they come from her soul. Among her top sellers are a girl getting rained on and a girl crying. Another is called “Heart on Sleeve,” a man with a small heart on his sleeve, holding a bird. Shelly says, “When I sit down with my sketch book, I’m looking inside. I try to tap into the places your brain goes if you just let it. I’m connecting with other human beings, and I love that.”

It is Shelly’s commitment to her craft and the purity by which she creates that prompted her loving husband Curt Wozniak, and two other friends, to nominate Shelly to receive the Distinguished Alumni Award.